


Broken, Ancient Things

by VespidaeQueen



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Gen, Magical Artifacts, Magical Science, Post-Game
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-21
Updated: 2015-03-21
Packaged: 2018-03-18 20:29:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,087
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3582885
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/VespidaeQueen/pseuds/VespidaeQueen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There's no one better to show an ancient, shattered, mysterious artifact to than Dagna.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Broken, Ancient Things

**Author's Note:**

> Originally intended to be part of a longer story, I think this works well enough on it's own. The Lavellan is the same as in [Splinter and Spite](http://archiveofourown.org/works/3150062) and is named Eaving.

“Dagna?” Eaving pokes her head into the undercroft, eyes searching for her arcanist. She doesn’t see her, but that doesn’t mean she isn’t _here_. Somewhere.

Something clangs, something clacks; she hears it sharply over the sound of the waterfall.

“Inquisitor?”

The entire room has only grown more cluttered and filled with equipment as time has passed, things that Dagna has deemed very necessary for magically scientific advancement. Eaving finds Dagna beneath one of the new machines, her feet sticking out from beneath it.

“I hope you’re under there on purpose,” she says dryly, and she hears Dagna laugh.

“Oh, I _am_. The calibration on this thing is all wrong - it terribly hard to get it calibrated, but I’ll be out in _just_ a moment, don’t you mind me!”

“I can wait,” Eaving says, though that is not entirely true. She is practically vibrating within her skin, a nervous, excited anxiety that wells up within her.

There is the sound of metal on metal and Dagna cursing loudly. Eaving waits for perhaps five minutes, leaning back carefully against the edge of a worktable. Eventually, her arcanist shoves herself out from under the contraption, wiping greasy hands on her heavy leather apron.

“So! What can I do for you, Inquisitor?” Dagna chirps, eyes bright. She has soot all smudge over her nose and cheeks, and her hair is coming loose from its bindings.

“I’ve got something I’d like you to look at,” Eaving says, holding out the carefully wrapped package. “It might _not_ be as interesting as that memory crystal I had you messing with, but on the other hand it has the _potential_ to be _far_ more interesting.”

“Less interesting but more interesting? Sounds complicated.” Dagna clears a space on her worktable, moving heavy metal tools that Eaving has no name for to the side. “Come on, set it down and I’ll take a look!”

Eaving sets the bundle down and unwraps the top of the cloth. The artifact lies in pieces, shattered shards. It feels like a dead lump of rock to her, but if _anyone_ can find a remaining spark of _something_ in it, it’s Dagna.

It is not unexpected when Dagna’s eyes go wide. “ _Oh!_ ” Dagna leans over the pieces, her teeth caught on her lip. She peers at the artifact almost reverently. “What is _this?_ ”

“It’s what created my mark,” Eaving tells her, and Dagna’s eyes go wider. She looks up, and she is positively _glowing_.

“ _Really?_ Oh, Inquisitor, have I ever mentioned how much I love working here? You always bring me the most fascinating things.”

Eaving’s lips curl up into a smile. “Don’t thank me until you’ve looked at it, Dagna. As you can see, it’s _very_ broken. I don’t know if there’s anything left in it.”

Dagna presses her lips together and leans closer to the largest chunk of the artifact. For a moment, she just looks at it, then, ever so carefully, she reaches out with a gloved hand and picks it up.

“Well, it’s kind of dead,” Dagna tells her as she turns it over. “But that doesn’t mean there’s nothing there. Magic leaves imprints - like a fingerprint, I guess. Well, maybe not like a fingerprint - you can wipe fingerprints away pretty easy, and magic takes a bit more scrubbing. And this thing? If it made that mark on your hand, then it’s powerful. That would _definitely_ leave something behind.”

Eaving leans against the table, arms crossed. “It’s some sort of ancient elven artifact,” she tells her. “They could have made it so that, if it was broken, the magic would erase itself.”

“ _Maybe_.” Dagna pokes her tongue out, squinting in concentration. An array of expressions cross her face too fast for Eaving to read them, and then she fairly bolts across the room to where one of her odd contraptions sits upon a desk. “I mean, those elves built some really neat things. Did I ever tell you how I got my hands on this old keystone? My friend - Finn, you wouldn’t know him, but he used to bring me all sorts of things when I studied at Kinloch Hold - brought it back after one of his adventures. It was this little runestone built to unlock things. It had this whole coiled, magical code inside it. I don’t know what it was made to unlock, but it was _amazing_. _This_ , though,” Dagna places the artifact underneath a lense, peering into a scope and adjusting knobs. “ _Oh_ , Inquisitor, you _have_ to see this. I mean, you can only _sort_ of see it, and it’s kind of nonsense, I mean _I_ certainly couldn’t tell you what it means - but _look_!”

She moves out of the way and gestures towards the scope. Eaving bends down to see it, eyes only a fraction of an inch from the lenses. Everything is blurred and she cannot tell what it is that Dagna wishes her to see.

“It’s...a smudge?” she guesses, and Dagna gives a long suffering sigh.

“You can adjust the focus. Here, let me - tell me if this is better.”

Dials click, and eventually Eaving shoos Dagna’s fingers away once she has an idea of what to change. The lenses change and shift until she finds them focused upon the surface of the artifact.

She blinks.

“ _What_.”

“ _Exactly,_ Inquisitor. _What_ is the question! What does it _mean?_ I can’t read it, but maybe you can?”

There is script - fine and tiny, so small that she can barely make it out even with the magnifying scope. The lines etched around the surface of the artifact suddenly make sense - in the base of them, there are words. Something written in ancient elvhen, preserved here.

Eaving feels a shocking thrill of excitement.

“No,” she says. “Well, yes. Maybe. _That_ word means _lock_ , and...that’s about what I can make out right now. I can barely see it, though, and even then - deciphering this will be a large task.”

“And that’s not all there is to this thing. I mean, I’m pretty sure that’s not all it is. I still have _so_ many tests to run! I can transcribe the writing as best I can and run it by you?”

“ _Yes_ ,” Eaving says, almost too fast. “Absolutely. As soon as you have it - have _any_ of it - I would _love_ to see it. I need to know what this is.”

“Well,” Dagna says with a bright, determined, her face alight. “I can’t tell you what it is _yet_ , Inquisitor, but I’m going to find out.”

 


End file.
